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Beauty addresses itself chiefly to sight; but there is a
beauty for the hearing too, as in certain combinations of words
and in all kinds of music, for melodies and cadences are
beautiful; and minds that lift themselves above the realm of
sense to a higher order are aware of beauty in the conduct of
life, in actions, in character, in the pursuits of the intellect;
and there is the beauty of the virtues. What loftier beauty there
may be, yet, our argument will bring to light.
What, then, is it that gives comeliness to material forms and
draws the ear to the sweetness perceived in sounds, and what is
the secret of the beauty there is in all that derives from Soul?
Is there some One Principle from which all take their grace, or
is there a beauty peculiar to the embodied and another for the
bodiless? Finally, one or many, what would such a Principle be?
Consider that some things, material shapes for instance, are
gracious not by anything inherent but by something communicated,
while others are lovely of themselves, as, for example, Virtue.
The same bodies appear sometimes beautiful, sometimes not; so
that there is a good deal between being body and being beautiful.
What, then, is this something that shows itself in certain
material forms? This is the natural beginning of our enquiry.
What is it that attracts the eyes of those to whom a beautiful
object is presented, and calls them, lures them, towards it, and
fills them with joy at the sight? If we possess ourselves of
this, we have at once a standpoint for the wider survey.
Almost everyone declares that the symmetry of parts towards each
other and towards a whole, with, besides, a certain charm of
colour, constitutes the beauty recognized by the eye, that in
visible things, as indeed in all else, universally, the beautiful
thing is essentially symmetrical, patterned.
But think what this means.
Only a compound can be beautiful, never anything devoid of parts;
and only a whole; the several parts will have beauty, not in
themselves, but only as working together to give a comely total.
Yet beauty in an aggregate demands beauty in details; it cannot
be constructed out of ugliness; its law must run throughout.
All the loveliness of colour and even the light of the sun, being
devoid of parts and so not beautiful by symmetry, must be ruled
out of the realm of beauty. And how comes gold to be a beautiful
thing? And lightning by night, and the stars, why are these so
fair?
In sounds also the simple must be proscribed, though often in a
whole noble composition each several tone is delicious in itself.
Again since the one face, constant in symmetry, appears sometimes
fair and sometimes not, can we doubt that beauty is something
more than symmetry, that symmetry itself owes its beauty to a
remoter principle?
Turn to what is attractive in methods of life or in the
expression of thought; are we to call in symmetry here? What
symmetry is to be found in noble conduct, or excellent laws, in
any form of mental pursuit?
What symmetry can there be in points of abstract thought?
The symmetry of being accordant with each other? But there may be
accordance or entire identity where there is nothing but
ugliness: the proposition that honesty is merely a generous
artlessness chimes in the most perfect harmony with the
proposition that morality means weakness of will; the accordance
is complete.
Then again, all the virtues are a beauty of the soul, a beauty
authentic beyond any of these others; but how does symmetry enter
here? The soul, it is true, is not a simple unity, but still its
virtue cannot have the symmetry of size or of number: what
standard of measurement could preside over the compromise or the
coalescence of the soul's faculties or purposes?
Finally, how by this theory would there be beauty in the
Intellectual-Principle, essentially the solitary?
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